50 Greatest Super Heroes In Comic Book History

7. The Flash

(Write-up by Nick Tylwalk, Bam Smack Pow Editor)

With the exception of Usain Bolt and a relative handful of men throughout the years, none of us know what it’s like to be the fastest human on the planet. Super-speed might be a pretty simple power, but it’s one that speaks to something primal in all of us. Who wouldn’t want to open up to a full sprint and find that you could outrun jets?

That alone would be enough to make the Flash an all-time great, but DC also made him the foremost example of a legacy hero. Whether you grew up with Jay Garrick, Barry Allen or Wally West, there was a Flash for you, and all of them were fantastic characters in their own right.

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Add in an instantly memorable (if somewhat gaudy) color scheme, one of comics’ most colorful casts of recurring villains in the Rogues and the fact that Allen gave his life in truly poignant fashion during the original Crisis on Infinite Earths, and you’ve got the recipe for a top 10 super hero. It’s just taken the general public a while to catch up — pun intended — with that train of thought.

If anything, the Flash is also a character whose peak popularity could still be ahead of him. His TV series on The CW is off to a very promising and well-regarded start, and he’s going to get his turn in the movies before the end of this decade. The next generation of super hero fans is likely to have more than ever claiming the Fastest Man Alive as their favorite, and it’s about time.

Next: No. 6: The do-it-yourself super hero